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Instagram Decides To Double Down On Security

February 17, 2016 By Chen Lai Leave a Comment

Instagram adds a second lock to its doors with two-factor authentication.

As the popularity of the giant company continues to grow, Instagram decides to double down on security with two-factor authentication. This initiative is meant to help prevent security breaches and will serve to reassure Instagram’s 400 million users, including celebrities and brands.

If you’re an active social-media user, you can’t deny the phenomenon of Instagram. Over the past few years, it has become one of the most dominant social network. According to some studies, 23% of American teenagers’ responses to the question ‘What’s your favorite social network?’ correspond to ‘Instagram’.

However, up to this point, logging into Instagram only required a user ID and password. TechCrunch is reporting that soon users will be able to opt for a temporary code to be texted to them, as a second step in the login process.

For those of you who are particular about their Instagram account’s security, then this is a feature you’ll want to check out.

Essentially, the two-step verification works like it does on any other platform. Once you activate it, Instagram will send a verification code to a phone number and once you put the code in, you’ll be able to access the account. This will ensure that should someone get access to your password and email ID for Instagram, they won’t be able to log in.

Moreover, this initiative is a long belated move by the service, which has become the photo sharing service of choice for many celebrities. Last year, Taylor Swift was the victim of a hack, where a user took over her account and posted several pictures that were later deleted when her team regained control of it. Without two-factor, they only had to change her password on Instagram.

Presently, the site lacks any firm security feature. Similar to Facebook, one cannot access others’ photos if the account is private. Also, Instagram doesn’t let anyone download the images. The service has been adopted by many major companies including Google, Facebook, and Twitter.

Athough the update hasn’t rolled out quite yet, we should keep an eye out for app updates. In the meantime, we can make sure that our backup email address and every other account we own is two-factored to the hilt.

That being said, the new measure is expected to be greeted with much enthusiasm by users of the picture based, social networking platform. Hopefully, the two-step verification feature will roll out to more users soon.

Image Source: iprex.com.

Facebook And Instagram Are Creating Computer Art Using Your Photos

February 1, 2016 By Brian Galloway Leave a Comment

The two online companies, Facebook and Instagram are using their customer’s photos to create computer art. What does this mean, exactly? The social networks convert every uploaded photo in an html page using ASCII characters.

ASCII (The American Standard Code for Information Interchange) is a character-encoding scheme.

These codes represent text in computers, communication equipment, and other devices that use text. Most modern character-encoding schemes are based on ASCII, though they support many additional characters, according to Wikipedia.

Now, let’s get back to the art part. Imagine having your Facebook or Instagram photo transformed into a piece of ASCII pixel art. Let’s take this photo of The Mona Lisa, for example.

This is how it originally looks like.

And this is how it would look like, using ASCII art-filter.

Now, this is exactly how Facebook or Instagram photos are transformed.

The good news is that you can test this for yourself, following some easy steps.

On Facebook, you can simply right click on their chosen photo, paste the URL link on the address bar, and add “.html” at the end to receive a colored ASCII copy. Another step or so-called ‘trick’ involves adding “.txt” to the end of the URL, to create a black and white version of a photo.

On Instagram, the process might be more complicated, but bears a definite result. You have to right click on the image for “view page source”. You could easily look for the URL there if you search (Shortcut: CTRL + F) by keyword “jpg”. If you copy paste the URL and add “.html” should be enough.

And there it is! The simple recipe for anyone who wants to see what their snapshots would have looked like on a 1980s Mac or MS-DOS PC.

It’s good to know that the revelatory discovery came from Mathias Bynens, a web standards enthusiast, who posted about it on his Twitter account. Bynens is the one that also points out the difference of results, depending on the adding of “.html” or “.txt” to the image URL.

Of course that there are some mysteries regarding this new discovery: Why would anyone follow the process, just to see the result of their photo transformed in bits and pieces? Why would Facebook keep this feature hidden to the public as if it’s part of something big?

The answer remains to be find out in the future. However, the artsy ASCII doesn’t look that bad and it can be a way of having fun, when one gets too bored and wants to see how their photos would look like with a touch of this magic.

Image Sources: dizayntablo.com/; mkweb.bcgsc.ca; petapixel.com.

Sleep Is Affected By Social Media

January 27, 2016 By Chen Lai Leave a Comment

"woman in bed checking her social media accounts on her smartphone"

The light emitted by our devices can increase brain activity preventing us from falling asleep.

A recent survey that involved 1,700 participants concluded that sleep is affected by social media. It seems that young people are caught in a vicious cycle in which they cannot sleep, therefore, decide to check their social media accounts which leads to insomnia to kick in.

The book on the nightstand was replaced a couple of years ago with a tablet or a smartphone. People, especially the targeted audience of the study which were male and female individuals between the ages of 17 and 32, seem to think that checking their Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Tinder before going to bed is a good way of relaxing and getting ready to catch up on some missing Zs.

But the latest study shows that sleep is affected by social media and this habit is exactly what’s keeping a lot of people from resting up and look fresh in their morning selfies.

The study in question was conducted via a nationwide survey. The list of queries was comprised out of 11 questions developed by the researchers in order to discover if sleep is affected by social media. The questions were focused on the frequency with which the volunteer participants used social platforms like Facebook, Tumblr or SnapChat before going to sleep and the frequency of sleepless nights.

A researcher with a post-doctorate degree, Jessica C. Levinson, who is also the author of the study in question, says this is the first time when somebody researches the link between a poor sleep quality and social platforms. And the results state clearly that sleep is affected by social media.

It seems that a good night’s rest doesn’t depend only on how often or for how long you check your Facebook before going to sleep, but also, the amount of physical exercise you do during the day. According to Levinson, the people who spent more time outdoors and engaged in a physical activity like sports or exercise, and who kept their mobile devices on silent more, slept much better than those who kept in touch with the virtual world.

Levinson says that out of all the volunteer participants in the study, 30% were dealing with some sort of sleep issues. These individuals were also likely to spend an average of 61 minutes a day on social media, which leads to a total of 30 visits on the platforms in a week.

The participants who spent more time on the platforms had up to 50% chances of falling asleep after a longer period of time or even falling asleep at all. This is due to the display units of our devices which stimulate our brain.

Levinson published the study in which she concluded that sleep is affected by social media in the online magazine Preventive Medicine.

If your sleep is affected by social media, experts recommend reading a book or meditating before sleep. The white pages of the book or the calming effects of meditation will help you fall asleep instantly.

Image source: www.envato.com

Instagram Rolls Out New Filters To Give An Amazing Look To Your Pictures

December 17, 2014 By Deborah Nielsen Leave a Comment

Instagram rolled out five new image filters, real-time commenting and slow-motion video uploading. The new tools are available for iOS version 6.4 and Android version 6.12.

Now users can do a lot more than sharing their pictures on Instagram. The new features will allow them to make use of frames and filters for the images they captured from their smartphones. Users can also utilize these filters to take images from the app.

Instagram also upgraded the old filters available in the app. However, the new filters are located at the front side of filter tray of users. These five filters are named as Aden, Prepetua, Ludwig, Crema and Slumber. They delicately alter the colors to give a new look to the picture. Sometimes it dulls or sharpens a color in order to provide numerous look of the picture.

Additionally, Instagram released a new layout as well through which users can hide the filters which they use rarely.

Instagram releases these new features to compete with the rivals like Twitter. The company is presently working on its new business model which would probably finish in 2015.

Two years ago, Facebook purchased Instagram at a large amount of money $715 million. The social networking firm really wants to generate great revenue with Instagram.

Currently, Instagram has around 300 million monthly active users. The figures are more than the active users of Twitter and Facebook. The firm has incredibly increased its audience in the past nine months.

Instagram Adds 5 New Filters To Boost Up Your Needs

December 17, 2014 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

Instagram has released five completely new filters to satisfy the most extensive users of the app.

The company said in a blog post that it is releasing five completely new set of filters in addition to the previous 19 in order to treat those who are inspired by photography, fashion, art and design of the app’s community.

The app users would no longer be limited to 19 old filters, spending hours pondering which filter to use in order to best portray a selfie with their favorite pet.

The filters released are namely Slumber which takes the best out of a rainy day picture, Crema which makes everything smooth as the froth on an espresso, Ludwig which can bring out the tiniest details of a great architecture, Aden which can reflect the very true nature of autumn’s golden leaves and last is Perpetua which is built around the dreamy VSCO Cam that can highlight both the sunlight and shadows evenly.

The update also lets users hide filters that they rarely use.

Instagram hits a mark of 300 Million documented users

December 10, 2014 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

Recently Instagram just hit a mark of 300 Million verified users leaving behind Twitter with 284 Million users.

The snap and video-centric social service receives about a chunk of 70 million photos and videos everyday related to their daily events, fun selfies and anything they want to share.

All this data can be shared to any other social web services like Facebook, Twitter and many more. Instagram was bought by Facebook (with 1.35 B users) back in 2012.

The pho-centric site has already surpassed the mark of 200 M in March this year after attaining 100 M just after 13 months of its release.

CEO Kevin Systrom said in a blog “We’re thrilled to watch this community thrive and witness the amazing connections people make over shared passions and journeys,”

Last month Instagram also did some intensification for its users to interact more, which includes some search improvements and content editing tools.

As the users are increasing day by day, Instagram plans to make its platform even richer in features. Systrom announced a recent plan to introduce verified Badges for its users like celebrities, brands, athletes etc, which will conductive for the users to connect to the authentic accounts.

Systrom also mentioned that de-spamming service on another verge may lead to an addition in dwindling list of followers but He promised that “Most of you won’t see any impact”.

New update in Instagram allows users to edit their captions

November 11, 2014 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

When it comes to Instagram, a perfect caption is almost as important as the photo itself. So that is why it is quite frustrating when you make an error on the word or want to change the thing that you incorrectly wrote when crafting your caption or leaving a comment in Instagram, the app simply does not allow you to do edit or modify again.

But Instagram’s latest update, which is live in the App Store as of Monday afternoon, changes that. You can now edit photo captions after they’ve already been posted. Version 6.2.0 also introduces a new discovery tool in the Explore tab, shows off some small design changes, and now lets you edit your photo’s location. But you still can’t edit comments you’ve made on other friends’ photos, though.

This matters as some of us who make mistakes while writing, have to delete the stuff that we have already posted and again go over all the editing, cropping and all other things that come along as well. So it basically saves a lot of time. So thanks but no thanks Instagram. This feature should’ve been here ages ago.

Besides the editing feature, Instagram’s discovery tool, called Explore, has some new things to show off. It now sports a magnifying glass icon instead of a compass, and you can browse for new content by Photos or by People, just switch between these two tabs. Explore presents you with photos and people you might find interesting, based on accounts you already follow, photos you’ve already liked, and photos that are trending in your location.

The Profile icon also received a small tweak, showing just a silhouette instead of the card like image it had before. And if you go to the profile page of a user with a lot of followers, you’ll now find suggested accounts hidden behind a drop-down arrow instead.

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